Derinkuyu: Turkey’s Underground City | Hacker News Reader

Derinkuyu: Turkey’s Underground City

historicmysteries.com

111 pointsflannery39 comments

I've been. It is a truly impressive feat of human engineering and very fun to explore. It is sad that politics prevent people from visiting it now.

I wonder what system they had to keep things lit up. I imagine if you were somewhere down there without lights you'd have a bad time.

I've been in that situation, close to closing time. I was alone, many stories down in the depths of the complex, when without warning the lights went out. I've never experienced such utter, black-out darkness. I was instantly paralysed with fear. The lights came on again after too many seconds of blackness, and I dashed out into daylight as fast as I could. I had to pause several times on the way out while the attendant switched off the lights a few more times.

If you ever get a chance to visit, do so - there are several underground cities in the region, all slightly different. They're fascinating.

That sounds utterly terrifying. I'm surprised you still recommend the visit!

Worst case maximum wait for help <24H ... its not that bad.

They probably used oil lamps. This technology was already well-known when these tunnels were dug, and they certainly had access to olive oil.

The guide told us they were using castor oil lamps.

Lights, sewage are pretty easily answered but what about ventilation?

Apparently they had a large well that acted also as ventilation shaft.

I have been there years ago. There is another theory that these are Victorian fakes. They show little sign of habitation, eg remains of stuff or lost things. Which is also why dating them is hard.

They show little signs now, or they also used to show little sign? The pictures in the article are from what I am assuming are the open-to-the-public section, which is likely swept often.

No, down the wells and things, in the cracks, where you expect to find things, not just lying around.

Why would they dig a fake 18-level underground city?

tourism seems the obvious answer.

People love to make things underground. There's the famous dude in England who did it during a depression hiring people just cause.

Of course perhaps 2000 years ago people were bored and did it for fun too, it could still be historic.

Near to where I used to live in East London a mad old guy known as the 'Mole Man of Hackney' dug so many tunnels under his house the pavement collapsed...

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2006/aug/08/communities....

It did never make sense to me.

8 kilometer long tunnel, how the heck did you accurately connect it. They told the story but there was not much accuracy of where it was.

Baddies come, you hide in the ground, they light fires on top and kill you all or bury you etc. Being in a constrictive space with the enemy outside seemed a bad idea.

It's not like bunkers which are used against aerial bombings. Or escape tunnels to go from A to B.

It's pathetic that the author has written Turks slaughtered Greeks in 1900s and forced them to leave. An absolute ignorance of history. If Turks has slaughtered any Christian population in their country, how had these people been able to live for above 400 years under their ruling? Oh of course, by hiding in underground cities in Cappadocia.

At least the wikipedia articles seems to agree with the author.

  These cities continued to be used by the Christian natives 
  as protection from the Mongolian incursions of Timur in 
  the 14th century.[7][8]

  After the region fell to the Ottomans, the cities were used 
  as refuges (Cappadocian Greek: καταφύγια) from the Turkish
  Muslim rulers.[9] As late as the 20th century the locals, 
  called Cappadocian Greeks, were still using the underground
  cities to escape periodic waves of Ottoman persecution.[9]
  R. M. Dawkins, a Cambridge linguist who conducted research
  on the Cappodocian Greek natives in the area from 1909-1911, 
  recorded that in 1909, "when the news came of the recent 
  massacres at Adana, a great part of the population at Axo took
  refuge in these underground chambers, and for some nights did 
  not venture to sleep above ground."

Many books are written to shape the history in the benefits of some countries. Linking them with other topics will attract more attention and will help to exaggerate effects of their claims. The passage above from wikipedia is a nice example of this propaganda technique. Underground cities are associated with totally another political issue. The blog post, the situation is just inflated and dramatized more: domino effect. It would be too long and unnecessary to answer all accusations, though. Here is not a place for historical or political discussions. Therefore, to sum up, as a local of Cappadocia, I can say that these places are not really unknown places. In this area, there are many underground cities inside the villages (since at least 1900s), not in isolated places. People used these places as warehouses. If a crime existed, then people could have been found there at most as hardly as in a normal village. Hiding on mountains would be a more plausible option. In the early centuries, against invasions, it may be safer than a regular village, because they are generally inside valleys and not in a place where a popular road passes. So, it can't be discovered from far points by eyes.

There are many churches in caves or as buildings. The ones as buildings are from 1800s. Ones in the caves are more older apparently. Also, many historical Greek houses exist. Majority of them contains caves as parts.

How does sewage work in there?

Pots, probably. You do your business in a chamber pot, and there was probably someone whose job it was to collect it all. The solid wastes get composted, the liquid gets processed for its ammonia, used in cleaning.

Cappadocia is definitely worth a visit. I've seen these and they are awesome. There is a vertical shaft that they think was for ventilation and emergencies - a straight drop with holds cut into the rock - would have needed a good head for heights!

I don't think Cappadocia is that risky to visit atm, but personally I wouldn't want to visit while Erdogan is still in power. We shouldn't be rewarding dictators.

I agree. I happened to have visitedCappadocia and Derinkuyu during the week of the (orchestrated?) coup last summer. It was safe. The tourism companies already took a huge hit, for example at one point we were the only guests in our hotel.

Cappadocia is indeed beautiful, in a unique way. The underground "cities" (villages, really) weren't even my favourite part.

I have friends that were in Turkey recently and they also mentioned its not as risky as it seems. Alternate-point: Decline in tourism hurts average people the most. Many people's live in regions especially like Cappadocia depend on the tourism industry. Enabling the people to enable their own prosperity may be another way to see it.

Wow. How is your visit is rewarding a political figure? I am sure local people will appreciate your thoughtfulness.

The majority of the population appear to support Erdogan. I'm not giving Turkey a penny until they return to proper democracy.

Do "the majority of the population" have to run their preferences by you first before they get to exercise their choice?

Is there some approved whitelist of candidates, compiled in Western capitals, that needs to be circulated amongst Turks, so that they can exercise their "democratic rights", as long as its only from that sheet of paper?

An amazing definition of "democracy" you have running in your head.

(I know I replied to you elsewhere, but this gem deserved its own response)

Silly Turks, voting for their own choice of leader, without first taking your opinion on board and going along with that.

Someone needs to educate them about what true "Western sponsored" democracy means, I guess.

Oh wait, thats what that attempted coup was for, right? Oops ...

Most sane observers don't view Erdogan as positive for Turkey. I'm with them. No visit to Turkey until things get a bit less fundamentalist.

I advise you to not to visit any of those asian or latin countries with corrupt, undemocratic administrations. Actually I should advise you to leave US immediately, your presence is rewarding Trump and GOP.

Turkey is a lot more than Erdoğan or his party.

It seems like CNN's opinions/propaganda is shaping your travel activism.

I don't live in the US and consider CNN perhaps the worst of the MSM, so you have me wrong. I've seen a lot of Turkey so probably have more experience than you think - the majority of the population seem to be behind Erdogan so there's no way I'm visiting Turkey until things change.

Please tell me whatever carbon-emitting white country you live on to make you think you have the moral superiority over my people?

> the majority of the population seem to be behind Erdogan

Whatever you feel about his policies, this one fact goes against the assertion that he's a dictator.

That, and the slightly inconvenient fact that he keeps winning elections and/or referendums.

Or that the odd hastily-enacted coup gets confronted by the MAJORITY of Turkish civil society.

Or does your definition of democracy = "do what we (Westerners) want, irrespective of the wishes of the MAJORITY of your populace"?

> so there's no way I'm visiting Turkey until things change.

Your loss. I don't anyone there really cares ...

Finally signed up for a yc account for this. As an American who has lived in Turkey for over half a decade, I offer you an opinion that a) it isn't currently particularly unsafe compared to any European cultural capitol (a credit, in part, to their recently depleted security and intelligence communities), b) Turkey has a multitude of viewpoints with the clearest divide (about 50/50) between conservatives and liberals (sound familiar?), c) visiting Turkey in spite of recent CNN-amplified drama, mostly rewards the people in the tourism industry who have been hurt most by the massive drop in revenue from both terrorism and political instability. Travel and form your own opinions.

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